


Sweet Summer Sun

by GotTheSilver



Category: Almost Famous (2000)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-09
Updated: 2013-01-09
Packaged: 2017-11-24 07:30:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/631958
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GotTheSilver/pseuds/GotTheSilver
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sapphire watches it all unfold during the summer of '73.</p><p>Part of <a href="http://trope-bingo.dreamwidth.org/">Trope Bingo</a>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sweet Summer Sun

**Author's Note:**

> Trope: Holiday.
> 
> Title from The Rolling Stones - Loving Cup.

Sapphire doesn’t know the last time she spent a holiday at home. Not even Thanksgiving or Christmas, there’s always somewhere to go, a tour to jump on, a band to hang with. She’s seen Thanksgiving from the back of a tourbus, Valentines Day on an airplane, Christmas hiding in a closet from a guitarist too high to know what he was doing.

The Stillwater tour is the calmest tour she’s been on, Penny Lane drama aside (she doesn’t mind Penny’s drama, she just thinks it must get tiring sometimes, so many men in love with the idea of who you are) and on the 4th of July they’re somewhere in middle America with Dick trying to track down fireworks.

Russell is manning the grill, attempting to impress Penny she thinks, but he’s better than her father used to be. He’s better than Tom used to be, the man her town thought she should marry before Deep Purple hit their city and she found a new life. There are hot dogs and burgers being flung around, she ducks under a table to hide from Jeff squirting mustard across the parking lot.

There are girls painting the flag across their bare chests, Sapphire can’t help but laugh at their obviousness. She’s sure they’ll find a place, a bed for the night, and wake up tomorrow with a headache and stories to tell their friends at school on Monday. She flips her hair and grabs a beer from the ice box and watches the girls, watches the boys, wonders where Penny and the kid are.

The kid loves Penny, that much is obvious. Penny is more mysterious, as always, Sapphire wonders if Penny will ever be able to love with her whole heart. Sapphire knows Penny thinks she loves Russell, as much as Penny likes to protest otherwise, and if Penny fools herself into believing it, she’ll have her heart cracked.

Sapphire glances a hand over Ed’s hair as he naps and settles herself on a garden chair by the tourbus, far away enough from the grill that the smoke won’t bother her. Black Sabbath are still playing in the distance, and the Stillwater road crew are packing up. They’re working faster than Sapphire has ever seen them move before, eager to make it to the barbeque before all the food and girls are gone.

There’s a blow up pool being filled with lukewarm water by a girl in cut offs and cowboy boots and Sapphire can see someone smacking their face on the concrete of the parking lot before the end of the night. Sapphire turns her head as she hears the tell tale clack of Penny’s heels on the ground. She leans against the chair Sapphire is sitting on and ducks her head, kisses her lips, Penny tastes like cherries, she always tastes like cherries.

Everyone cheers when they see Penny, Russell is the loudest. Sapphire can’t decide if Russell loves Penny. He’s too self involved to love anyone but himself, and possibly music. Sapphire knows the stories, his ex wife, his current wife - he’s got a twisted past, no mistaking that. There’s darkness there, as there always is with the great ones, the ones who have the potential to become icons, but only time will tell if Russell falls into it.

Penny’s going to get hurt by him, if only because she’ll be told to vanish once the tour hits New York. Sapphire knows Penny isn’t stupid, that she gets the deal of disappearing once hometown partners visit the circus, but there’s something there on this tour that makes Sapphire think it’ll end badly. That maybe a lot of people she loves won’t come out of this unscathed.

Sapphire doesn’t reject the idea of love, she’s felt it with a guy, even if it’s never worked out the way she’d hoped when she was younger. But it’s the circus, and she’s seen people lie, hurt others and end up with permanent scars all because they gave their hearts to someone.

Russell has found an acoustic guitar, Penny’s sitting by his feet and the kid is standing a way aways watching them with a look in his eyes Sapphire can’t quite place.

There’s a reason she only falls in love with the music.


End file.
